Aikido and The Art of Selling
by: Ari Galper
Imagine being in a crowded concert or bar. All of a sudden, a fight breaks out between two men whoกve had too much to drink.
You happen to be a few steps away, and the next thing you know, one of the men turns to you and looks as if heกs going to take a swing at you.
Whatกs your first instinct? Most of us will do one of two things. Weกll either try to step away, or weกll raise our arms to deflect him and fight back, which can result in harm to you or to your attacker.
But if you were trained in Aikido, the Japanese martial art that focuses on diverting an attackerกs energy, you could quickly diffuse the situation by immobilizing him without harming him in any way.
In essence, you’re diffusing the energy that heกs using to try and attack you in a way that takes the conflict out of the situation.
Unlock The Game and the philosophy behind Aikido have many similarities.
Traditional cold calling and selling are designed to focus only on the ขcloseข by presenting or in too many cases, ขpushingข your solution onto prospects, sometimes even when they’re not interested.
But if you focus only on your goal of making the sale before having a discussion about the problems that you can help your prospects solve, something happens.
They start feeling that you’re ขattackingข them. After all, you’re a stranger to them, and when you start talking about yourself and your solution rather than about them and their specific issues, you immediately trigger their suspicion and cause them to start ขpushing back.ข
This pushback is the resistance or energy that Unlock The Game teaches you to diffuse. Then both of you can quickly ขget on the same pageข and open a natural dialogue that will let you determine whether it makes sense for you to work together.
Letกs look at two real selling scenarios cold calling and ขgetyouoffthephoneข objections:
Scenario 1: Cold Calling
Suppose you’re at your desk and you receive a call from someone who says ขHi, my name is Jack Johnson, Iกm with XYZ Company, and we’re a fullsolution provider of…ข Is your first reaction to welcome and be open to his call? Or do your mental defenses immediately kick in and you shut down against this stranger ขsalespersonข?
Probably the latter, especially if you sense that the caller is focused on his interests and not yours.
Thatกs why this oldschool cold calling approach triggers the resistance and negative energy that prospects immediately throw your way.
The Unlock The Game way to make a successful cold call กsuccessfulข being defined as not triggering rejection is by beginning your call with, ขHi, my name is Jack, maybe you can help me out for a moment?ข That simple question is a very natural way of beginning a conversation with a stranger.
But you can’t just read this word for word, like a script. It won’t work. That would be like an Aikido instructor teaching a firsttime student the physical movements before he or she has learned the philosophy necessary to carry them out.
The same applies here. First you need to integrate a new Mindset that changes the goal of your call from making the sale, or getting an appointment, to engaging the person in a natural twoway dialogue.
To do this, your voice has to be lowkey. You have to avoid communicating any hint of typical ขsalespersonข enthusiasm, or any sense that you’re trying to direct the conversation to an end goal. Once you integrate the Mindset, all this kicks in naturally.
So, if you want to succeed in prospecting and cold calling, become aware of how you might be triggering the resistance or energy that instinctively causes prospects to push back against you.
Scenario 2: ขGetyouoffthephoneข objections
Hereกs another example. Forget the idea of ขovercoming objections.ข Doing that only triggers more resistance from prospects thatกs very difficult to diffuse.
Think about it for a moment. When prospects give a reason why they don’t want to proceed when they ขput up resistanceข youกve been trained to ขovercomeข their objections rather than to diffuse their resistance by acknowledging that what they’re telling you is their truth.
By applying the Unlock The Game Mindset™ and skills, you diffuse that resistance and remove the conflict from the situation, just as in Aikido.
Hereกs the Unlock The Game™ process for dealing with objections:
1. Diffuse the objection with ขThatกs not a problem… (Pause)ข
2. Acknowledge the truth of their objection (see the sample language below).
3. Reopen the conversation with ขWould you be open to…ข
For example, suppose a prospect says, ขWe already have a vendor.ข The path of diffusing and reengaging would go like this:
1. ขThatกs not a problem…(Pause)ข
2. ขI wasn’t calling to replace the vendor you’re currently using.ข Here, you’re addressing their suspicion that your only focus is on making the sale and on ripping out their relationship with their current vendor. You’re simply asking whether they would be open to different ideas that might help them solve a problem. This diffuses the tension.
3. ขWould you be open to some different ideas that you might not be using now?ข After the tension is dissolved, this lets you reopen the conversation in a natural way because they clearly understand that your goal is to help them. Then, if things are a match between you, you can decide where to go from there.
Keep in mind that this process will work only if you fully integrate the Mindset so it feels as natural to you as breathing.
In short, if you’re using any form of traditional selling, you could be triggering a resistance every time you communicate with your prospect.
But if you learn this new Mindset, along with words and phrases that remove any conflict or tension from the relationship, youกll have taken your first steps toward your black belt in Unlock The Game™!
About The Author
Ari Galper makes cold calling painless and simple. Learn his cold calling secrets that even the sales gurus don’t know. To receive your 10 free audio minilessons visit http://www.UnlockTheColdCallingGame.com
This article was posted on September 05
by Ari Galper